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Modern scholarship has made an effort to reconstruct Jerome's translations of the New and Old Testament. It has thus emerged that he only revised the text of the Gospels, but not of Acts, the Epistles or Revelation since the passages Jerome cites from these books of the New Testament differ very often from the text of the Vulgate. And in his commentaries on the Pauline Epistles to Philemon, the Galatians, the Ephesians and Titus, which were written in 386, i.e. shortly after the alleged revision of the New Testament,9 Jerome never referred to his own translation, but only criticized an anonymous Latinus interpres on several occasions. Stylistic reasons, especially regarding the Latin translation of Acts, finally shake his declaration made in De viris iliustribus that he had translated the whole New Testament from the Greek into Latin.10 This statement might at best be understood as an intention which was never fully realized, unless one would like to call it an intentional exaggeration.11 The Vulgate version of Acts, the Pauline Epistles and Revelation is now ascribed to an author working in Rome at the end of the fourth century; the modern editors of the Vetus Latina in particular are prepared to identify this translator with Rufinus the Syrian who is said to have been a friend of Jerome and Epiphanius of Salamis until he, at the beginning of the fifth century, went over to the Pelagian movement to appear as the author of the Liber de Fide.12

Jerome started his revision of the Bible with the translation of the Gospels during his stay in Rome from 382 to 385 after he had won the financial and theological support of the Roman bishop Damasus for his ambitious project.13

One big potential error here. Jerome did not do the rest of the New Testament in 384. It was done after many of these comments, as indicated in the Prologue to the Canonical Epistles.

Amy Donaldson references to Jerome

Answer to the assertion:

However, there is no real difference between how Jerome references the sections we know he did do (the Gospels) and the sections about which we inquire. And we have to explain the many NT textual elements. (There is also the chronology issue, many of the quotes may be before the translation.)

supposed late dating of the Vulgate Prologue was key to the opposition to its authenticity.

From Grantley McDonald:

Emlyn applauded Mill’s refusal to credit the improbable notion that the comma was erased by heretics, and his rejection of the prologue to the Catholic
Epistles as the work of ‘some silly Rhapsodist after Bede’s time’. - Biblical Criticism in Early Modern Europe: Erasmus, the Johannine Comma and Trinitarian Debate p. 211

Just one of many examples of how the supposed late dating of the Vulgate Prologue was key to the opposition to its authenticity.

This is in the 1794 3rd edition of Travis, which also has a list of Vulgate mss, and whether they have the Prologue or not. In fact, the whole book should be reviewed for any other gems. The reply on the Preface is also in the 1785 edition. Here we have a classic "multiplication of nothings."

In this disquisition it may, perhaps, be the most satisfactory method to state the objections of the chief opponents of this Verse singly, and to subjoin to each its distinct and separate reply. Of these

Sandius, (b)
M. Simon, [c) and
Mr. Emlyn (d) among its more early opponents; and

among its more modern adversaries—seem to have been the mod diffuse in the variety of their remarks, and the most determined in their opposition. p. 71-72 (note this is general verse opposition, not specifically the Vulgate Prologue authenticity.

Next we move to the Vulgate Prologue section of Benson, and each one has a solid Travis response.

XIV - "It is not in Jerome’s catalogue of prefaces”

XV - “It [this preface] is often found in Latin MSS, without his [Jerome’j] name”

XVI - “It [the preface] makes use of the words canonical epistles: whereas Jerome's title for them was The Catholic Epistles.”

XVII - “That preface is prefixed to some Latin copies of the Catholic epistles: in which the disputed text is not insersted.”

XVIII - “The preface is not found in some of the best and most ancient MSS of Jerome's Version."

XIX. “It [tbe Preface] infuriates one falsehood—that all the Greek copies of the New Testament had this verse. Whereas none of them had it. And Jerome, above all men, who was so couversant in the Greek copies of the New Testament, must needs have known this to have been a direct falsehood.”
XX. “ Nor has any of the genuine works of the Greek fathers once mentioned it”—[viz. the Verse 1 John v:7.]
(answered over 30+ pages)

XXI. “ It [the Preface] asserts two other direct and notorious falsehoods [viz. first] that the Latin translators were unfaithful in leaving out the testimony of the Father, the Word, and the Spirit

XXII. The other “ direct and notorious falsehood which this Preface asserts is—that he [Jerome] had restored this Verse.”

XXIII. “ Augustine, who was intimate with Jerome, kept a correspondence with him, read his works, and more especially his Latin Version of the New Testament, has never once, in all his voluminous works, mentioned the disputed text.'

XXIV. “What may put the matter [the spuriousness of the Preface] out of all dispute is, Jerome himself in his genuine voluminous works, hath never quoted this disputed passage."

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Compare to the reasons of Martianay

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And the new information on the Harleianus, that it counts as an early Vulgate with the Prologue.

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And most important to check is the information above Eustochium prodding Jerome before the Prologue. This is potentially incredible info.

Vincent of Lerins - Peregrinus - unknown editor- please, must be somebody other than Jerome!

This was in the "Metzger Charade" thread, but it is helpful here as part of the comedy of errors of faux attribution of various forgers, the potential rogue's gallery. (Also remember that Erasmus at one point accuses Jerome of forging the verse!)

Raymond E. Brown's appendix in his Anchor Commentary series on The Epistles of John still holds that the Prologue was not written by Jerome in 1982.

Steven
Raymond Edward Brown (1928-1998) is one of the only modern scholars writing against authenticity who offers real scholarship. His theory is that the forgery was for the purpose of moving the heavenly witnesses forward in the Latin Bible transmission. Here is his full section, which is simply assertion without evidence.

Raymond Brown
To the period before 550 belongs a Prologue to the Catholic Epistles, falsely attributed to Jerome, which is preserved in the Codex Fuldensis (PL 29, 827-31). Although the Codex itself does not contain the Comma, the Prologue states that the Comma is genuine but has been omitted by unfaithful translators. The Prologue has been attributed to Vincent of Lerins (d. 450) and to Peregrinus (Künstle, Ayuso Marazuela), the fifth-century Spanish editor of the Vg. In any case, Jerome's authority was such that this statement, spuriously attributed to him, helped to win acceptance for the Comma. (1982 p. 782-783)

So Brown goes out on a limb and says that right after Jerome died, a forger fooled everyone, and quickly wrote a really sweet Prologue, whose single nefarious purpose was to push through this new verse. See Ockham above.

Beyond that, Brown adds a tidbit of information about who had which possible forger (remember, Chapman demolished the Peregrinus theory long ago). He gives us nothing about the substantive issues, indicating the rule of circularity.